The confirmation hearing for Sen. Jeff Sessions to be attorney general will run for two days starting Jan. 10, Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Charles E. Grassley of Iowa announced Friday.

Grassley limited the length of the hearing, and had said previously that he wants to head off Democratic attacks on the Alabama Republican’s character. He said prior confirmation hearings for attorney general nominees lasted one or two days and featured three to nine outside witnesses at each.

That’s half the number of days than Democrats sought for a Sessions confirmation hearing. Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California, the committee's incoming ranking member, and other Democrats wrote a letter to Grassley that asked for four days to thoroughly air the background of their colleague and former prosecutor who seeks to be the nation’s top law enforcement officer.

With vocal opposition to Sessions’s nomination from progressive advocacy groups, the hearing looks to be contentious. Democrats asked for time to examine Sessions’s record on immigration, violence against women, LGBT protections, racial justice, hate crimes, workers’ rights, voting rights, criminal justice and other issues.

Grassley also announced that Sessions has turned in answers to the committee's questionnaire for presidential nominees, which the chairman said will become available on the panel's web site. It was not immediately available Friday night.

The questionnaire includes standard biographical information, such as work history and public statements, but also includes significant legal matters a candidate has handled as well as sources of income and net worth statements.

Sessions' hearing will also occur 32 days after he returned the committee's questionnaire, affording adequate time for Judiciary members to prepare for the hearing, Grassley said in a statement.

“I appreciate Senator Sessions’ prompt response. We will begin reviewing his questionnaire and going through the documents so we’re ready to hold a fair and thorough hearing on Jan. 10,” Grassley said. “We all know Senator Sessions to be an honorable man who has held public office for more than 20 years. I look forward to hearing from him next month.”

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For a party that gained seats, the aftermath of November’s election has resulted in unusually loud griping from Democratic members about the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, specifically its staff.

Rep. Tim Ryan said last week that if he were in charge, he’d ask the DCCC staff to reapply for their jobs.

Coming from the Ohio Democrat who unsuccessfully challenged Nancy Pelosi for minority leader, that’s not shocking. He hasn’t regularly paid his DCCC dues or been active in the committee.

Ohio Rep. Marcy Kaptur also once weighed a challenge to Pelosi. This year, she was a Pelosi loyalist, but she, too, said she’s had a “terrible experience” with the DCCC staff.

Whether or not disgruntled members’ grievances about the DCCC are legitimate, their complaints are indicative of a disconnect between parts of the caucus and the committee.

The griping isn’t directed at New Mexico Rep. Ben Ray Luján, whom the caucus elected to a second term as committee chairman Monday night.

“We truly believe he never really headed the DCCC,” Arizona Rep. Ruben Gallego said last week. The perception is that Pelosi ran the show, beginning with her appointment of the chairman.

Members generally like Luján and believe that making his slot an elected position is a step toward bringing transparency to a committee that they think needs more of it — even if they’re not quite sure what it is they’re looking for behind the curtain.

Whatever it is, they believe it begins with wresting perceived power away from staff. “Our mission,” Gallego said, is “this is going to be a membership-driven DCCC instead of staff- and consultant-driven.”

Despite losing the presidency, Democrats picked up a net of six House seats in 2016. It’s the first time since 2000 that the party lost the White House but netted House seats.

And yet, the DCCC fell below expectations publicly set by leadership and came nowhere close to winning the 30 seats needed to take the majority during a presidential year when Democrats should have had the advantage based on turnout.

Midwestern Democrats have blamed the DCCC for abandoning its working-class base. Traditionally, though, crafting a national economic message is the job of Congress or the White House.

Democrats face a challenging map, which won’t change until they control enough state legislatures to redraw congressional districts in their favor. But red-state Democrats are especially frustrated by what they perceive as a lack of initiative from the committee to contest districts in their areas of the country.

Kaptur sees it in her own backyard. The fact that Democrats hold just four of the state’s 16 congressional seats isn’t just about gerrymandering, she said, but “DCCC neglect.”

“It is not for lack of Ohio members trying to penetrate their closed minds over there,” Kaptur said.

“We go back and we say, ‘We have some individuals that we believe have the capability to run and also, we have media organizations that have won elections in our part of the country, we want you to consider them.’ It’s always no. No, no, no, no,” she said.

Currently, Republicans don’t hold a single Ohio district that President Barack Obama carried, so there aren’t any obvious takeover targets where the committee would spend limited resources.

But it’s not just red states where the DCCC is faulted for not playing more aggressively. The party failed to land top-shelf recruits in the Philadelphia suburbs and in at least two Illinois seats previously drawn to elect a Democrat.

In its first post-election discussion with members last month, Luján said that many of their recruits were on a upward trajectory — with Virginia’s LuAnn Bennett tied with Rep. Barbara Comstock, for example — until the release of the letter from FBI Director James B. Comey about potentially reopening an investigation into Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton’s emails.

But some Democrats say they’ve heard similar excuses after disappointing election results in 2010, 2012 and 2014.

“As long as the storyline is, ‘Our polling was great! Our strategy was perfect. James Comey screwed us,’ then it’s a sign there’s no drive for accountability,” one Democratic consultant said. “Somehow, every cycle when the DCCC falls short, someone else is to blame,” he said.

That perception of failure exists among some members who are taking aim at a campaign committee that they don’t think has been working for them. A member’s opinion of the DCCC is influenced by their reliance on the committee to get elected and re-elected.

The committee held weekly recruitment meetings, open to all members. The first recruitment meeting for 2018 is Thursday.

But most members aren’t intricately involved enough with the committee’s operations to articulate what it is that they think is wrong with the committee or its staff.

“I sat in all the recruitment meetings that were run by Cheri Bustos and Denny Heck, and I thought they did a great job,” said New York Rep. Kathleen Rice, elected in 2014 from a district Obama twice carried by double digits. “But I didn’t know anything about the staffers that were there. Was everything being carried out? We just don’t know.”

As eager as they are to give Luján another chance, members are taking their frustrations out on the committee staff — much more so than in cycles past.

“We realize that it’s also unfair to blame him for the direction of the DCCC when systematically that staff of the DCCC, starting from the top, and almost all the way through middle-management, has been nothing but bureaucratic and ineffective for many, many years,” Gallego said last week when answering a question about why he wanted to keep Luján on as DCCC chairman.

“He wasn’t given the time or the power to get rid of them,” the freshman Democrat added.

While Gallego and others suggested the staff was handpicked by Pelosi, that’s hardly the vast majority of bodies sitting in the DCCC’s South Capitol Street office.

“It’s far easier to blame a nameless, faceless, nebulous staff than it is to confront reality,” said a senior Democratic strategist not working with the committee this cycle.

Ryan, who’s had limited interaction with the committee, pointed his finger at the greater web of political consultants who do business for the DCCC and their recruits. “They need to go on a consultant detox,” he said.

“There’s a closed shop,” a Democratic consultant added. “That would be OK if there were a record of success,” he said, but “we’re not winning the close races.”

Of the seats Democrats gained, Illinois’ 10th District and Nevada’s 4th District were seats that Obama carried by double digits and that Democrats arguably should have won in any presidential year. In two others — Florida’s 7th District and New Jersey’s 5th District — Democrats had strong recruits but the GOP incumbents suffered self-inflicted wounds.

The perception remains that a limited class of consultants contributes to a group-think culture, but the committee’s independent expenditure arm did add at least five new consulting firms this year, including Latino and women-led shops.

“There are favorites that get played and that tends to be with the larger firms, or the people staff think they can get a job from,” another Democratic consultant said.

Any consultant who feels he or she isn’t getting enough business could have an incentive to complain. But “the closed shop” concern is bigger than one consultant or even one party.

“It is something we faced,” Oklahoma Rep. Tom Cole, former chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee, said outside the speaker’s lobby Monday night.

After losing 30 seats in 2006, Cole said the NRCC opened up.

“You put staff in and tell them, ‘I don’t want a select group of people here. We want to throw this open, we want everybody who’s a reasonable consultant to have a legitimate opportunity to compete,’” he said.

Pressed about what needs to change at the committee, especially at the staff level, Rice has consistently said it’s impossible to know without a post-mortem. “There has been no accountability for any race results since 2010,” she said last week.

The DCCC has conducted internal reviews of its data and messaging after each cycle, and shared much of their results with members in meetings and memos.

But New York Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney, who dropped his challenge to Luján for DCCC chairman, is now overseeing an unprecedented member-led after-action review.

He plans to interview consultants and members, likely a welcome overture to lawmakers who want to share their experiences. Minnesota Rep. Tim Walz, who had one of the closest margins of victory of any Democratic incumbent, said last week that no one at the DCCC or in leadership had yet asked him how he won while Clinton lost his 1st District seat.

But for any introspection to be effective, some Democrats say, a review must take into account not just one, but four cycles of disappointing results.

There is the big lie, the ‘Elvis is alive and kidnapped my baby and they were all sucked up into a spaceship’ kind of lie so beloved by supermarket tabloids and fringe websites. “Pizzagate” falls into that category. When you hear a conspiracy theory about underground tunnels and a child-abuse ring involving government officials and a pizza parlor in Washington, D.C., all you can do is shake your head — that is, unless you’re a guy with a rifle who decides to “self-investigate,” and ends up terrorizing a neighborhood.

Then there’s another kind of statement that sounds a little more reasonable than Elvis and aliens, but has a similar relation to the truth — the tales of millions of illegal and fraudulent voters who usurped my popular vote win or cost me that governorship, or of inner cities as unrelieved cauldrons of criminals, minorities and hopelessness. These stories are whispered by those who should know better, then repeated by more and more people in power. Uttered with a straight face, furrowed brow and a wheelbarrow full of fake concern, they insinuate themselves into policy that can change the character of our country.

I don’t know which is scarier.

Certainly Edgar Maddison Welch of Salisbury, North Carolina, who is accused of traveling all the way to Washington to ferret out secret tunnels in a restaurant, shook a lot of people, including children, upset by a man with a gun. Now that Michael G. Flynn — the son of Donald Trump’s national security adviser pick, retired Lt. Gen. Michael T. Flynn — has been removed as part of the new administration’s transition efforts after tweets pushing “Pizzagate,” will he have more time to follow nefarious plots just waiting to be revealed and resolved? Alex Jones, whose Infowars website is a clearing house for tall tales, is a Trump supporter, and Trump has called Jones’ reputation “amazing.”

One wonders if the FBI and its director James Comey are having second thoughts about putting clumsy thumbs on the scale of the presidential election with on-again, off-again investigations of Hillary Clinton’s email. Will they now have to waste time tracking down every crackpot lead launched on dubious websites and spread on Twitter, with taxpayers footing the bill for trips down winding blind alleys?

President-elect and sore winner Trump has himself devoted plenty of time spreading the baseless theory that illegal voters put Clinton way ahead in the popular vote. Coming from the top, this story could have continued consequences for American citizens who just want to embrace a fundamental right. Trump’s charges have been backed by Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach, an early and vocal endorser of candidate Trump, who may play a part in the new administration. Kobach is the architect of and the inspiration for immigration laws and voting restrictions that continue to pop up across the nation even as courts find many unconstitutional.

North Carolina Republican Gov. Pat McCrory met Trump in New York on Wednesday for conversation and a possible job interview. McCrory waited weeks to concede his Nov. 8 loss to Democratic opponent Attorney General Roy Cooper, insisting for too long that voting fraud caused him to come out on the wrong side of a close contest. In his concession statement, McCrory said there remained “questions that should be answered regarding the voting process,” despite GOP-controlled state election boards disagreeing with his campaign’s assertions that something fishy was going on with felons, dead people and voters in heavily minority districts. This comes after most of North Carolina’s voting restrictions were found to target African-Americans with “almost surgical precision” and tossed out by a federal court.

And what better time than now, when the line between fact and fiction is blurring, for theories about minorities and crime to take root; many had never gone away. Giving voice to beliefs that widen the racial divide has been a specialty of former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, poised to become more powerful. With “law and order” as a mantra and “stop and frisk” the solution he favors and Trump supports, despite flimsy legal justification, many minority Americans expect the worst. One bad sign: During his campaign, Trump tweeted an image with racially inflammatory and incorrect murder statistics, including the lie that blacks kill 81 percent of white homicide victims.

Perhaps South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, on Trump’s team as his choice for United Nations ambassador, can remind those in his inner circle that in the real world, fake news has serious consequences. Haley took some heat for an effort to have the Confederate flag removed from the statehouse grounds after Dylann Roof — a follower of websites that spread white supremacist vitriol and conspiracies — murdered nine welcoming black churchgoers in Charleston in June 2015.

Just weeks after that horrific crime, Breitbart News ran the headline: “Hoist It High and Proud: The Confederate Flag Proclaims a Glorious Heritage,” forcefully and falsely divorcing it from the hate it has often symbolized, especially since it was raised in 1961 not for noble purposes but in defiance of the civil rights movement, as politicians’ speeches made clear. Unfortunately, Haley’s message would have to be heard over former Breitbart leader Steve Bannon, a top Trump adviser.

Roof is now on trial in Charleston, where a video of a black man being shot in the back was not enough for a jury to call his killing by a police officer murder. We’re pretty far along in our transformation into a world where facts don’t matter as much as feelings and any theory to justify them. While it may not be pretty, it is the new normal, with validation coming from the top.

I think I saw Elvis in my living room last night. He was smiling.

Roll Call columnist Mary C. Curtis has worked at The New York Times, The Baltimore Sun and The Charlotte Observer. Follow her on Twitter @mcurtisnc3.

If we’re all lucky, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has stashed a blue bodysuit and a matching Republican-red cape-and-boots set in one of the old-school phone booths in the GOP cloakroom.

Over the next two years, at least, the Kentucky Republican will be the most important force for “truth, justice and the American Way” in Washington. He’s the guy with the power to protect the Senate, the Congress and the country from a new president who is both awash in power and hungry for more of it.

That won’t give comfort to liberals who revile McConnell for both his ideology and his uninterrupted eight-year besiegement of President Barack Obama’s legislative agenda and nominations. They’ll never see him as Superman.

But McConnell, as leader of the chamber most removed from the whims of the electorate, is the only man positioned to be a defender of the realm against the excesses of Trump, who cares little for the Constitution, laws or norms that have shaped this country.

Where McConnell and Trump are in line, the Senate majority leader will be the president’s greatest ally in navigating the tempestuous waters of the Senate. The question is how far McConnell will bend — or if he will break — in the face of grave assaults on congressional authority and American ideals. Already, Trump has threatened to jail political opponents and those who burn the flag.

No one in the modern Senate is more capable than McConnell of killing legislation he doesn’t like without leaving his fingerprints at the scene of the crime. Like the famed fictional superhero with the “S” on his chest, the Kentucky Republican is eager to mask his true identity when battling enemies and avoids calling attention to his own feats.

McConnell virtually disappeared during the presidential election, avoiding the fate of so many GOP leaders who tangled with Trump and created headaches for themselves and the party. There’s no reason to think that, when he’s of the mind to, the wily Kentuckian won’t find a way to fight Trump quietly — to frustrate the president’s agenda by burying it in the arcana of Senate processes.

House Speaker Paul Ryan, who found himself in a high-stakes war with Trump before the election, isn’t the guy to stand up to the White House. Too many of his members know that Trump is popular in their districts, and particularly with their primary electorates. Ryan simply doesn’t have control of his caucus or the rules structure to defy Trump without forcing a confrontation.

But the Senate is built, in the old aphorism, as the saucer that cools the hot tea splashing over the sides of the House. With a narrow majority, McConnell simply has to release a handful of Republicans to side with Democrats if and when Trump’s proposals are beyond the pale.

There’s also reason to think that McConnell has a stiff spine when it comes to major constitutional questions. He’s been a consistent defender of the First Amendment, declining to support proposed amendments to ban flag-burning. His critics point out that he cares about it only to bolster his position as an advocate for free speech — and the free flow of money — when it comes to campaign reform questions. But, after watching and reporting on McConnell for about 15 years, I believe his commitment runs deeper than that.

McConnell was also the Republican who fashioned deals with Vice President Joe Biden and other Democratic leaders to keep the government functioning and its credit rating intact at a time when the most raucous members of the GOP were happy to simply tear down any institution in sight.

The majority leader’s allegiance to the Senate’s prerogatives, and the nation’s standards, is sure to be tested by a president who seems to have a boundless enthusiasm for the accumulation and exercise of raw power — a man who stiffed contractors as a matter of standard practice, who believes he can bully any rival politician or country into submission, and who bragged about sexually assaulting women.

The truth is that, come January, McConnell may be the only man in America with the tools to defeat Trump. That puts him in a tight spot, and no one should expect that he’ll be a hero every time. But in his first post-election press conference, McConnell hinted that he won’t be anxious to go along with everything Trump wants — not just when it comes to enacting big spending programs that Democrats favor but also in terms of overreach by the president and his Republican allies.

That goes for congressional Republicans, who will be on the ballot again in the 2018 midterms but also for Trump. It’s McConnell’s job to make the political decisions that keep his party in control and his responsibility to protect the power of the legislative branch against the encroachments of the executive branch. At times, he will be the only real backstop for progressives and moderates.

So, if you see McConnell duck into one of those phone booths now and again and emerge wearing an “S” on his chest, don’t be surprised. The “S” stands for “Senate.”

Roll Call columnist Jonathan Allen is co-author of the New York Times-bestselling Clinton biography “HRC” and has covered Congress, the White House and elections over the past 15 years.

President-elect Donald Trump has announced who he’ll nominate for several of the high-profile positions for his incoming administration, but there's much speculation about who he'll put in the remaining spots.

Some of those Trump is considering worked for his opponents in the Republican primaries. Some even backed his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton.

He’s already tapped a few members of Congress and is considering more, including some from across the aisle. He’s also gone outside and chosen dealmakers like himself.

Here’s a look at who Trump has chosen and which positions are yet to be filled:

There has been more speculation about this position than almost any other in a Trump administration because it is one of the most prominent Cabinet positions and the secretary of state is responsible for carrying out the president’s foreign policy agenda.

Trump aides said Wednesday that the president-elect has narrowed his choices to four people: former Massachusetts Gov. and 2012 GOP presidential nominee Mitt Romney, former New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, former CIA Director Gen. David Petraeus, and Tennessee Republican Sen. Bob Corker.

Trump has met twice publicly with Romney, dining with him at an upscale Manhattan restaurant on Wednesday night. Romney called Trump a “con man” during the Republican primaries and news that Romney was being considered riled Trump supporters — campaign manager Kellyanne Conway made the rounds of political shows, saying that nominating Romney would be seen as a “betrayal” by those who backed Trump.

Giuliani and Petreaus come with their own problems: Questions linger about Giuliani’s global business ties and Petraeus’ legal issues stemming from his sentencing in 2015 to two years probation and a $100,000 fine for providing classified data to his biographer and mistress.

And Senate Republicans worry Trump and the GOP would look hypocritical for nominating and supporting Petraeus after Trump hammered Clinton during the campaign for her misuse of a personal email server and classified information while secretary of State.

Corker, who had been in the running to be Trump’s vice president, is chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. While he voted against the Iran nuclear deal, and wrote an op-ed in the Washington Post about his opposition to it, for some on the alt-right, that wasn’t enough.

Another potential pick is Tennessee GOP Sen. Bob Corker, who had been in the running to be Trump’s vice president and serves as chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. But Democrats have raised questions about Corker’s own criticized business dealings and disclosure missteps.

Among those who were reportedly considered for the post were John Bolton, the former United Nations ambassador, and California Rep. Dana Rohrabacher,

Trump on Wednesday announced former Goldman Sachs partner Steven Mnuchin would be his Treasury secretary. Mnuchin, 53, was Trump’s campaign finance chairman and an early supporter with ties to Wall Street.

Mnuchin, 53, a Yale graduate, is currently chairman and co-chief executive officer of Dune Capital Management, a hedge fund. He has also worked with billionaire financier George Soros, bought assets of a failing bank in California and launched a new lender, and produced movie blockbusters.

“I understand what needs to be done to fix the economy. I look forward to helping President-elect Trump implement a bold economic agenda that creates good-paying jobs and defends the American worker,” Mnuchin said in a statement.

“His selection as Treasury secretary should send shivers down the spine of every American who got hit hard by the financial crisis,” Warren said in a statement, “and is the latest sign that Donald Trump has no intention of draining the swamp and every intention of running Washington to benefit himself and his rich buddies.”

Also reportedly considered for the post were Texas GOP Rep. Jeb Hensarling, chairman of the House Financial Services Committee.

Trump announced Thursday that he would nominate retired Marine Corps Gen. James Mattis to run the Pentagon.

Mattis, 66, led the United States Central Command, which oversees military operations in the Middle East and Southwest Asia, from 2010 to 2013, but his tour there was cut short by the Obama administration, with which he clashed over Iran.

Senate Armed Services Chairman John McCain, R-Arizona, has already signaled that he believes Mattis is the right man for the job, an endorsement that will undoubtedly help with the confirmation process. But he could clash with Democrats in hearings over his views on women in combat and PTSD.

Arkansas Republican Sen. Tom Cotton, an Army veteran who served in Iraq and Afghanistan and Democratic Rep. Tulsi Gabbard of Hawaii, who backed Sen. Bernie Sanders in the presidential race, were also reportedly considered for the position.

One potential choice is outgoing Minnesota Rep. John Kline, who serves as chairman of the House Education and the Workforce Committee. Another possibility is Andrew Puzder, CEO of CKE Restaurants, the parent company of Hardee’s and Carl’s Jr. Puzder frequently publishes op-eds about business and labor. He also recently said he is interested in using automation as an alternative to minimum wage increases.

Rep. Lou Barletta, an early Trump backer and a member of his transition team, said he has spoken to Trump about potentially taking the post.

Another potential pick is Victoria Lipnic, who serves on the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.

Trump chose Betsy DeVos, 58, chairwoman of the American Federation for Children, which advocates expanding school choice in K-12 education, to run the Department of Education. She is married to Dick DeVos, the son of Amway co-founder Richard DeVos. The couple donated $2.75 million to Republican candidates during the 2016 election cycle, according to the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics.

“The status quo in education is not acceptable,” DeVos said in a statement. “Together, we can work to make transformational change that ensures every student in America has the opportunity to fulfill his or her highest potential.”

Also considered for Education was former Washington D.C. schools chancellor Michelle Rhee, a Democrat who had come under fire for her support of charter schools and Common Core.

Some conservatives have advocated leaving the Education secretary post open so Trump can do away with the position and the department entirely.

Trump selected Rep. Tom Price, to helm HHS. The Georgia Republican was an early Trump supporter and currently chairs the House Budget Committee. An orthopedic surgeon, Price is a vocal opponent of the health law and has advocated a full repeal on multiple occasions.

Republicans, including Trump, have made repeal of the law and passage of replacement legislation a top priority for next year. As HHS secretary, Price would likely have a large amount of influence over the creation of a new system.

Former Louisiana Gov. and congressman Bobby Jindal was also under consideration for the post. Jindal ran Louisiana’s Department of Health and Hospitals and was an assistant HHS secretary under President George W. Bush.

Wilbur Ross, 78, one of Trump’s economic advisers who founded his own firm based around reorganizing floundering companies, was named to the post on Wednesday. Ross is an outspoken critic of NAFTA, calling it one of the worst trade deals in recent history.

Ross runs the private equity firm W.L. Ross & Co. and, according to Forbes, has a net worth of $2.9 billion. Ross also worked with Trump to help restructure the debt for Trump Taj Mahal in Atlantic City, New Jersey.

PayPal founder Peter Thiel, who spoke on Trump’s behalf at the Republican National Convention in July, and former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee were also mentioned as possibilities.

Former Texas Gov. Rick Perry, infamous for once forgetting the Department of Energy when listing the three departments he would cut as president in a 2012 GOP debate, could become its head honcho.

Perry was one of the first well-known GOP leaders to endorse Donald Trump, after he dropped out of the 2016 race.

Other favorites for the job include Trump’s EPA transition man Myron Ebell, who has repeatedly condemned the global consensus on the existence and danger of climate change, and oil and gas investor Harold Hamm.

The person tapped for the position will be in charge of updating energy infrastructure and coordinating with the Defense Department on modernizing the U.S. nuclear arsenal.

Former Massachusetts Sen. Scott Brown said he has talked to Trump about heading the Department of Veterans Affairs. Brown, an early Trump backer, served for more than 30 years in the Army Reserve and served on the Veterans Affairs and Armed Services committees.

Warren has said she would back the nomination of Brown, who she beat in the Senate race in 2012.

Trump has also said he is considering Rep. Jeff Miller, R-Florida, one of Trump’s earliest backers in Congress who headed the Veterans Affairs Committee. Miller, who didn't run for re-election, said he hasn’t spoken to the transition team but would give an offer “serious consideration.”

Pete Hegseth, a Fox News contributor, has also been floated. Hegseth served as CEO of Concerned Veterans for America.

One potential pick is Sid Miller, who is currently Agriculture Commissioner in Texas. Miller served as co-chairman of Trump's agriculture advisory team, but he’s not without his problems. During the election, he tweeted a poll which referred to Clinton as the c-word. Miller later blamed the tweet on a third-party vendor and deleted it.

Another potential pick is outgoing Rep. Tim Huelskamp of Kansas. Huelskamp, who represented Kansas’ 1st District. Huelskamp is a member of the House Freedom Caucus but he caught the wrath of former House Speaker John A. Boehner and was booted from the House Agriculture Committee, which would lead to him losing his primary race this year.

Sam Brownback, the Republican governor of Kansas and former secretary of the Kansas Department of Agriculture, is also a possible pick. Brownback served as ranking member of the Senate subcommittee on agriculture before running for governor. He also mounted a brief presidential campaign in late 2006 but withdrew before the primaries, eventually endorsing McCain.

Former two-term Georgia Gov. Sonny Perdue also met with Trump in New York Wednesday morning and is regarded as another possible nominee.

Despite earlier reports, Sen. Jerry Moran, R-Kansas, said that Trump did not offer him the the top job at the Department of Agriculture.

Trump tweeted last week that he was seriously considering former presidential candidate and neurosurgeon Ben Carson to serve as the secretary of Housing and Urban Development, despite Carson having previously declined interest in a cabinet post. Carson ran against Trump in the Republican presidential primary, but the two became close after Carson dropped out of the race. He was a top Trump surrogate during the general election campaign.

Carson argued against the Obama administration’s fair housing plan, calling for less government involvement in social institutions, and equating the anti-discrimination attempt to “failed socialist experiments.” Carson’s acceptance of the HUD nomination has not been confirmed.

Robert Woodson, head of the Center for Neighborhood Enterprise, said he was being consideredfor the position. Woodson has been an adviserto House Speaker Paul D. Ryan on poverty since the end of the 2012 presidential election. He has known Ryan since the 1990s through Ryan’s mentor, the late Rep. Jack Kemp, who served as Housing and Urban Development Secretary during George H.W. Bush's administration.

Trump picked Elaine Chao to be his Transportation secretary. Chao served as Labor secretary for George W. Bush's administration and as deputy Transportation secretary and Director of the Peace Corps for former President George H.W. Bush. She is also married to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell

Outgoing Rep. John Mica, who lost his race to Democrat Stephanie Murphy after he was redistricted, indicated he was interested in the job. Mica served as chairman of the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee at one point during his tenure in the House. He also calledAmtrak a “Soviet-style operation.”

Multiple media outlets also reported Trump was considering former Democratic Rep. Harold Ford Jr. Ford, from Tennessee, served five terms in the House before running unsuccessfully for the Senate in 2006. He now serves as a managing director for Morgan Stanley.

Former chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board Mark Rosenker was also considered, the Washington Post reported.

Clues as to who Trump will pick to head the Interior Department are few and far between, though Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin seems to be the current favorite. An outspoken critic of the Obama administration, Fallin met with Trump at Trump Tower last week. She told reporters after the meeting the conversation revolved around Oklahoma’s Native American tribes and the oil and gas industry.

Another potential pick is Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, who met with Trump on Monday to discuss “optimization of federal lands, energy exploration and mining.” As chairwoman of the House Republican Conference, McMorris Rodgers has conservative credentials and can build relationships with her colleagues on the Hill.

Politico reported that Forrest Lucas, the co-founder of Indiana-based Lucas Oil, is also under consideration. Lucas was a major donor to Vice President-elect Mike Pence, with him and his wife giving more than $50,000 to Pence’s gubernatorial campaigns. But wife Charlotte Lucas’ inflammatory comments about Muslims and atheists, for which Forrest apologized, could make him a hard sell.

Texas Rep. Michael McCaul is the leading candidate to head Trump’s Department of Homeland Security. As chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee and a former federal prosecutor, McCaul is a logical pick for an administration short on experience.

McCaul has taken a special interest in matters of cybersecurity, championing last year’s information-sharing bill and repeatedly condemning the Obama administration’s counterterrorism efforts, and is reportedly eager for the job.

Another potential candidate is retired Marine Gen. John Kelly, who has been a vociferous critic of Obama's attempts to close Guantanamo Bay.

Trump also met with Milwaukee County Sheriff David Clarke on Monday. Clarke’s extreme approach to combating terrorism has riled civil rights groups. He has advocated for imprisoning terrorist sympathizers at Guantanamo Bay, questioning suspects without an attorney present and feeding cases to military tribunals rather than criminal courts.

Clarke has said he would accept a post in the administration if one was offered to him.

Myron Ebell, Trump’s EPA transition chair, is poised to take over the position full-time come January.

Ebell is a famous climate change denier and has criticized everyone from Obama to Pope Francis for perpetuating what he, and the president elect, deem to be an international “hoax.”

Along with Ebell, Trump is rumored to be considering Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt and Kathleen Hartnett White of the Texas Public Policy Foundation, both of whom met with the president-elect earlier this week. Environmental groups have expressed concern over Pruitt and Hartnett White for their critiques of the Obama administration’s plans to address climate change.

Trump has met with Gary Cohn, president and COO of the bank behemoth and has reportedly considered Cohn for the position as director.

Front-runner Linda Springer served as director of the Office of Personnel Management during George W. Bush’s second term and headed OMB’s Office of Federal Financial Management before that. Springer endorsed Trump in June, citing his “commitment to America” and “fresh perspective.”

Paul Winfree, director of the Heritage Foundation’s Institute for Economic Policy Studies, also is being considered. Winfree is a former Senate staffer, serving as director of income security for the Senate Committee on the Budget.

Former Oklahoma Sen. Tom Coburn may also be considered. Coburn, a fiscal conservative, is well-known in Republican circles for taking the hard line against “wasteful” government spending.

Cohn would be the third Goldman alum to accept a role in Trump’s administration, joining chief strategist Steve Bannon and Treasury pick Steve Mnuchin.

David Malpass, president of Encima Global, also might be under consideration, as well as South Carolina Republican Rep. Mick Mulvaney, who is to meet with Trump on Monday.

Because Trump has promised to renegotiate America’s various international trade deals himself, it’s uncertain who the president-elect will choose to be his official Trade Representative.

Dan DiMicco, former president and CEO of Nucor Corporation, is Trump’s chief trade adviser, and therefore seems poised to become trade rep in the new year. DiMicco is an outspoken critic of free trade and proponent of bringing back U.S. manufacturing jobs, publishing a book in 2015 titled, “American Made: Why Making Things Will Return Us to Greatness.”

After being overlooked for the Commerce job in favor of Wilbur Ross, Louisiana Rep. Charles Boustany became a possible choice for chief trade representative. A senior member of the Ways and Means Committee, Boustany returns to the House after missing out on the runoff in Louisiana’s Senate race, which will be decided on Dec. 10.

Trump selected Republican South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley to serve as his U.N. ambassador, second only to the secretary of State in carrying out U.S. foreign policy.

Haley had been floated as a secretary of State candidate, as well.

The child of Indian immigrants, Haley took a not-so-subtle swipe at Trump in the Republican response to the State of the Union address earlier this year, saying people should resist the temptation to “follow the siren call of the angriest voices” as Trump was emerging as front-runner in the Republican primaries rising a strong anti-immigrant message.

Trump to responded on Fox News that Haley was “very week on illegal immigration,” and that she had asked for “a hell of a lot of money” in campaign contributions.

Haley received praise for her push to remove the Confederate Battle flag from the grounds of the South Carolina State Capitol in the wake of the shooting of nine African-American churchgoers in Charleston.

Sen. Kelly Ayotte, who lost her race in New Hampshire to Democratic Gov. Maggie Hassan, was also being considered for the post, as was Richard Grenell, former spokesman for the ambassador under George W. Bush, who would have been the first openly gay American to fill the role.

Trump is likely to choose his circle of economic experts from the list he’s been working with for months. Despite promises to “drain the swamp,” Trump has relied heavily on Washington lobbyists, think tank lifers and big business magnates.

Lawrence Kudlow, Stephen Moore and Peter Navarro are possible candidates as all three have advised Trump on economic policy throughout his campaign.

Kudlow is well-known in media circles and has favored Trump’s tax plans since the election cycle’s early days, but hinted he might drop support for the then-Republican nominee following the release of the “Access Hollywood” tapes in October.

Moore is a traditional fiscal conservative with a penchant for the free market, a position somewhat at odds with Trump’s anti-trade rhetoric.

A business professor at the University of California-Irvine, Navarro’s economic and foreign policy opinions align with Trump’s “tough on China” platform.

There have not been many names floated for adminstrator of the Small Business Administration. One potential choiceis Mary Anne Bradfield, who is leading Trump's SBA team. Bradfield worked as an assistant to the SBA during the George W. Bush Administration and is a former lobbyist.

Another potential choice is Rep. Steve Chabot, R-Ohio, who is chairman of the House Small Business Committee.

With Donald Trump, three men have now been elected president who were born during a single 66-day period in mid-1946.

The statistics are boggling — three presidents out of the 841,000 babies born in June, July and August of that first post-war year. In contrast, the 55 million members of the Silent Generation (born between 1925 and 1945) failed to produce a single president.

These three successful graduates of the Electoral College had wildly different backgrounds. George W. Bush (July 6) was born into the WASP governing elite with his grandfather, Prescott Bush, soon to be elected senator from Connecticut. Trump (June 14) was blessed with money from his outer-borough New York City real estate developer father, Fred, but lacked social pedigree. And Bill Clinton (Aug. 19) had nothing beyond a devoted mother, Virginia Kelley.

But all three future presidents came into a world under the shadow of the atomic bomb.

On the day Trump was born, financier Bernard Baruch presented to the fledgling United Nations an American arms-control plan under which the United States would give up its atomic arsenal if other countries would abandon the nuclear option. After the Soviets balked, the United States on July 1 conducted an atom-bomb test (the first since World War II) on tiny Bikini Atoll in the Marshall Islands.

But there were also hints of the coming sexual revolution that summer. The atomic test inspired the French designer Louis Reard to call his explosive, exceptionally skimpy, two-piece bathing suit (unveiled on July 5) the bikini. And it was hard to top the smoldering heat between Lauren Bacall and Humphrey Bogart in “The Big Sleep” released that August.

As we grope to understand Trump, our first president with his thumb firmly on the Twitter button, it is easy to neglect the generational factor. Trump seems so impulsive, so instinctual, so nonreflective that it is tempting to regard him as a figure who stands outside history, unaffected by anything other than his own ego needs.

But for someone of Trump’s generation (and, yes, mine) every successful military image is lifted from World War II, which seemed real and immediate for baby boomers growing up in the 1950s. (Fred Trump, unlike George H.W. Bush and Clinton’s father, Bill Blythe Jr., was too old to serve). It is why Trump frequently evokes generals like George Patton and Douglas MacArthur.

For Trump — who ducked the draft like Clinton and, to some extent, Bush — every lost war is Vietnam revisited. Yes, Trump made a crude boast to Howard Stern in 1997 that surviving the sexual merry-go-round disease-free was his “personal Vietnam.” But that doesn’t mean that images of American soldiers coming home in body bags aren’t lodged somewhere in Trump’s brain.

Maybe I’m being too charitable to a president-elect who during the campaign seemed cavalier about whether Japan or Saudi Arabia might develop nuclear weapons. But for someone who came of age during the Cold War — and who undoubtedly participated in nuclear drills as a young student at the private Kew-Forest elementary school — it is difficult to entirely escape a visceral fear that New York could disappear with a mushroom cloud.

As Trump wrestles with the demands of the Secret Service, his mind must flash back to the dominant tragedy of his youth — the 1963 assassination of John F. Kennedy. Long before 9/11, this was the where-were-you-when-you-heard moment for an entire generation.

My guess is that for Trump, JFK rather than Ronald Reagan defines presidential glamor. While Reagan represented dignified old Hollywood, Kennedy defined the Rat-Pack lifestyle with a beautiful wife, dozens of women on the side, adoring crowds and Marilyn Monroe cooing, “Happy Birthday, Mr. President.” On a visceral level, Trump is probably disappointed that Frank Sinatra is unavailable to perform at the Inauguration.

Richard Nixon would also loom large in Trump’s memory even if the president-elect didn’t have outside advisers like Paul Manafort and Roger Stone who apprenticed under Tricky Dick. Trump, after all, unapologetically lifted his law-and-order campaign theme (and the use of scary, if bogus, crime statistics) from Nixon’s 1968 playbook.

Nixon also serves as a reminder to Trump that there is only one unforgivable sin in American politics — getting caught. Trump certainly channeled Nixon when he recently told The New York Times, “The law’s totally on my side, meaning, the president can’t have a conflict of interest.”

Trump is likely to be the last president more comfortable with dictating tweets — and everything else — than typing them himself. Only baby boomers who had secretaries early in life (like Trump and Bill Clinton) can still get away with being baffled by the details of 21st century technology.

(Of course, if Hillary Clinton didn’t have an early feminist’s disdain for secretarial skills, she might have learned how to manage her own emails. Which would have meant that Huma Abedin wouldn’t have had to print them out at home on the computer system she shared with Anthony Weiner. Change that one factor and Hillary, rather than Trump, would be picking a Cabinet as president-elect.)

Trump — like all presidents and not just Reagan — probably has a movie running in his head as he imagines the next four years. The narrative presumably has been molded by every president who touched Trump’s consciousness, maybe dating back to Dwight Eisenhower.

How it will all play out is impossible to guess, although there have been post-election reasons to shudder. But Trump, like Clinton and Bush from the baby-blanket Class of 1946, remains a product and a prisoner of his own living history.

Roll Call columnist Walter Shapiro is a veteran of Politics Daily, USA Today, Time, Newsweek and the Washington Post. His book on his con-man great-uncle was just published: “Hustling Hitler: The Jewish Vaudevillian Who Fooled the Fuhrer.” Follow him on Twitter @MrWalterShapiro.